264 THE NINE FISH MOST HIGHLY PRIZED 



were divinatory pebbles shaken in the gUttering caldron of 

 Apollo. These sacred associations are all suggested by the 

 language of our enthusiast : 



" It is not meet for every man to taste, 

 Nor see it with his eyes. Nay, he must hold 

 The hollow woven-work of marsh-grown wicker 

 And rattle pebbles in his glittering count." 



But the words, though reminiscent of actual cult, have a double 

 entendre and are meant to bear a more mundane meaning. In 

 plain prose, then, " it needs a wealthy man with capacious 

 cash-box (literally a basket, fiscus) and a ratthng big bank- 

 account (pebbles to reckon L. S. D.) to afford such a luxury 

 as this ! " 



Not far behind it among Greek epicures came the Glaucus, 

 possibly the sea-grayHng, of whose " most precious head " 

 Anaxandrides is enamoured, and Antiphanes and JuUus 

 Pollux write with appreciative gusto. But are not all things 

 about the Glaucus written in the seventh book of the Deipno- 

 sopMstcB, chapters 45, 46, and 47 ? 



9. The Buglossiis, or Lingulaca [Solea vulgaris, the " Sole " ^), 

 alike at Rome and at Athens the most prized, if not the most 

 lauded in verse, of the Flatfish, held rank as high as any, 

 actually far higher than its so-called cousin, the Passer. 



Although Xenocrates and Galen differ as to the firmness 

 or reverse of its flesh— I wonder whether the latter got hold 

 of a Lemon Sole !— the ancient agrees \vith the modern faculty 

 in accounting it " very nourishing, and of most pleasant 

 flavour." 2 It then as now was almost always the first fish 

 ordered, " as soon as men be sick or ill at ease " in Plutarch's 

 time and words. 



1 See Stephanus, Thesaurus Gycbccb LingucE, ii. 347 c-d. 



- Badham (plagiarising Blaikie), on p. 364— in " Galen, Xenocrates, 

 Diphilus speak disparagingly of the Sole," is inaccurate. Xenocrates ternis 

 its flesh indigestible. Galen states that it is quite the reverse, and commends 

 it highly as a diet. Diphilus does not hesitate to declare that the Sole atiords 

 abundant nourishment and is most pleasing to the taste. Cf. Nonnms, p. 89. 

 In the case of a Sole with its customarily modest dimensions it is not easy 

 to hearken unto the command, which was laid down in the twelfth century 

 for the benefit of Robert, the so-called King of England, " Anglorum Kegi 

 bcripsit schola tota Salerni," by " the Schoolc of Salernes most learned and 



